paper figures, always connected by the hands
by winteredspark
Summary: /Shifting noises, and her fingers link with his. He doesn't need words, not when he has this./ Or, when the two unlikeliest people discover they have all too much in common.


**/paper figures, always connected by the hands/**

**Weird couple, I know, but in my mind, it fits. I loved the way this started out, but by the time it got to the end I was losing inspiration, and it sort of became eh. Lemme know what you think.**

;;

She's no star student and he's certainly not a primadonna. She uses the kitchen table to stretch out her new jeans, and he caringly rips another hole in the left knee of a pair of jeans he got five years ago. She curls her hair to perfection and he runs a hand through his "aladdin" styled hair just to mess it up.

The only reason they know each other at all is because Tori's her sister and he wakes up a few too many times with the scent of _VictoriaVega_ all over his lips.

;

It's Jade that goads him to go to the party at Ryder Daniel's house. He doesn't really like Ryder all that much, has hung around that slime-of-a-narcissist a few too many times, and after seeing Tori used by him -

(but Jade doesn't need to know he thinks about that.)

Anyways, she goads him to do it:

"Don't be a pussy."

"Don't be so vulgar."

"I'd start being nice if you would just go. Everyone's going to be there!"

"You? Nice? Psssh, right."

"Whatever, Aladdin. Just don't expect to get any head from me for -"

"You really aren't going to let this go, are you?"

She smirks, confident, toying with him. "Nope."

And thus, he ended up here, lying on a table in what he assumes is the living room. There's whirling bodies, but he can't put faces to them; every time he tries, stars burst into being - red, blue green, dazzling - and circle around, laughing. The music is pulsing throughout the house, and he starts to close his eyes, inhaling with a little hiccup. Jade's the one that got him like this, insisting that he was some kind of lightweight for not wanting to drink. So, of course, he started taking shots and he honestly lost count after the fifth one.

"Hey there, you." She slumps down on him and he inhales the scent of candied apples dizzily. It's strong, overpowering, but she's lying on top of him and he can't exactly push her off with the way he's feeling right now.

He tries to put a finger on who she is - his senses whisper _VictoriaVega_, and they _do_ look kind of alike, but she's no Tori. But then she's kissing him and begging in his ear - "take me, damn it" - and he's not trying to be the player and knock some girl up, but her breasts are hanging loose and she looks so appetizing.

So he kisses her back while sliding a hand up her shirt, and looses himself in a whirl of colors.

;

She finds him the next day when his head is pounding, and he's cursing under his breath while trying to stop Jade and Tori from fighting, _again_.

"Does your head hurt as much as mine does?" She breathes the question in his ear, and he stiffens as he inhales the scent of candied apples.

He turns to look at her, eyes dark.

She's limping away.

(and damn it, the rage pulsing in his veins is whispering, "you screwed tori vega's sister, and you hurt her. you bastard," and his fingertips are trembling.)

;

"Trina, I -"

"Don't apologize." She turns to look at him from her perch on the couch. "Just get out of my house."

He takes a step closer, "Look, I was drunk, and I wasn't thinking, and -"

"I was drunk too," she says, rubbing her head as if to dispell thoughts of moaning and hangovers. "But I guess I saw -"

She cuts off as feet echo from the stairwell, then Trina Vega is gone, out the front door, and he's left to stare at Tori Vega's confused brown eyes - _they're so much like her sister's._

"Did I hear Trina?"

"Um, no," he lies through gritted teeth. "Just mumbling to myself while I waited for you."

She smiles, loops her arms around his neck, "Our little secret?"

_Tori Vega isn't vindictive_, Beck tries to tell himself while their lips meet. _She cares about me._

(for the first time, he feels guilty for kissing her back, guilty for hurting Jade, guilt.)

;

He calls her.

"What did you see, Trina?"

"Why did you call me?"

He breathes in and out, trying not to wake Jade as she sleeps beside him.

"Tori cut you off. I wanted to hear what you had to say."

"Do you?" Silence, for a moment. "You are, after all, screwing my sister."

She hangs up.

;

Two minutes later his cell phone vibrates, and he answers the call.

"Hello?"

"I saw the same desperation in you that I feel all the time. The feeling that no one understands, and that there's something more waiting for you, but you just can't see it yet."

He bites his tongue - curses at the pain - but doesn't know what to say.

(because who knew Trina Vega was any more than a primadonna?)

;

Two days later he sees her sitting alone at lunch; eyes meet each other, and she smiles as if to say _"no one gets me, remember?"_

He's trying to pluck up the courage to go sit with her, when -

"Beck, get your ass over here."

He links hands with Jade under the table and tries to get Trina's face out of his mind.

;

Phone rings.

"I just had a dream about you," she breathes, "Beckett."

"Was I finally where I belong?"

Silence, then -

"Fuck me."

He bites his lower lip, because with the mess he's already gotten himself into, this will only make it worse.

"Give me five minutes."

He practically throws himself into her arms, his fingers diving to cup her skinny waist as she kisses him. It doesn't make sense; they both feel so alone, so it would seem that being together, as he thrusts himself into her and hears her cry out, would solve that. That being together would make him feel whole.

But, as she claws her nails into his back, he realizes that he only feels the acute sense of _need_ all that more.

He feels her loneliness.

;

"My dad left when I was seven," she confesses to him when they're sitting outside school in his car. It's four in the morning, and it's cold as hell; fog is curling in all around them, but it's safe, and that's what matters.

"Why?"

She shrugs, "Wanted something more, I guess. We weren't good enough."

Beck strokes his chin thoughtfully, "But he's here now."

She nods, then her head falls on his shoulder, and realizes that Trina Vega isn't as strong as she'd like to be.

"He came back, because that blonde bitch he fucked was only temporary, and he _loved_ us to much to stay away forever." Her tone is bitter, burning with rage, sarcastic. "Mom tries so hard to keep him around now, and she's convinced we'll be a big happy family again, but I don't want any part of it."

"What about Tori?" he asks.

Trina shrugs, "She's the little _star_, now isn't she?"

He kisses the top of her head without thinking, and feels her stiffen up.

"Know what it means to be without a dad," he mumbles into her brown hair, because he knows she doesn't want to hear the words _i'm sorry_. "Mine passed away when I was a little kid, so I guess I shouldn't miss him. I do, though."

Shifting noises, and her fingers link with his.

He doesn't need words, not when he has this.

;

"Want some chocolate?" She holds the bar out to him, her fingers already covered in it.

"Um, sure." He reaches for a piece.

She snatches it away, "Then stop cheating on Jade with my sister. You may think it's ok to do, but -"

"Maybe I don't think it's ok to do," he mumbles. "Maybe Tori just makes me feel like I belong, and Jade just -"

"Jade is Jade." Trina lips tighten. "But what you're doing will only hurt the both of them."

"Well, I'm cheating with you, too."

She pauses to look at him, eyes unreadable.

"Not anymore."

Then she walks away, and Beck Oliver hasn't ever realized just how deep Trina Vega can be.

;

Jade wakes up to find a note on the pillow where Beck's head should be. Her first thought is that he's out screwing Tori Vega again - yes, she knows, she's not fucking stupid - and her hands tighten around the note, nearly ripping it to shreds.

That is, until she reads it.

_No more messing around. You're all I want - Aladdin_

;

He's got Trina pinned up against the RV, his lips pressed against hers as they kiss furiously - it's all they can do, rage, passion, because neither of them understands how to be gentle when they've never felt it before.

She pushes him away.

"You did the right thing, giving her that note."

"Then why do I feel like I've lost everything?" His fingers splay against the RV, trapping her.

She touches his cheek, "In the end, Jade's the one who'll make you feel understood. Not Tori, not anyone else -"

"Not even you?"

He kisses her again, and it's the first gentle kiss they've ever shared.

"I'll always be the primadonna," Trina says, "so this is it." She slides out from between his arms, forcing a smile.

Then she starts to walk away, and she never quite lost that limp.

"Trina?"

She turns, cocks an eyebrow.

"I think it's time you talk to your dad."

Her lips purse together, and he swears he sees her eyes shining a little too brightly.

"We'll see. Thanks for making me feel like a star."

Silence, footsteps, and she's gone like she was never there to begin with.

;

"I saw the note."

"Oh?"

He sits next to Jade on his bed and watches her chip at the black nail polish on her fingers.

"It was corny."

"I know."

"Did you mean it?" She looks at him with the look that trap him and he doesn't think he ever wants to lose the feeling of _this_, them.

"...Yeah."

Silence, then -

"Good, or I'll fucking kill Tori."

;;


End file.
